Description
The Palgrave Handbook of Mimetic Theory and Religion draws on the expertise of leading scholars and thinkers to explore the violent origins of culture, the meaning of ritual, and the conjunction of theology and anthropology, as well as secularization, science, and terrorism. Authors assess the contributions of René Girard’s mimetic theory to our understanding of sacrifice, ancient tragedy, and post-modernity, and apply its insights to religious cinema and the global economy. This handbook serves as introduction and guide to a theory of religion and human behavior that has established itself as fertile terrain for scholarly research and intellectual reflection.
Table of Contents
Part I
VIOLENT ORIGINS
Chapter 1. Introduction
James Alison and Paul Dumouchel
Chapter 2
An Essay on Hominization: Current Theories, Girardian-Darwinian Approaches
Paul Dumouchel
Chapter 3
The Emergence of Human Consciousness in a Religious Context
Pierpaolo Antonello
Chapter 4
Freud, Moses and Monotheism, and the Conversation between Mimetic Theory and Psychoanalysis
Kathryn M. Frost
Chapter 5
Kristeva and the Question of Origins
Martha J. Reineke
Chapter 6
Girard and Burkert: Hunting, Homo Necans, Guilt
Wolfgang Palaver
Chapter 7
Vengeance and the Gift
Mark R. Anspach
Chapter 8
Mesoamerican Civilizations and Sacrifice
Miguel Rolland
Chapter 9
Çatalhöyük, Archaeology, Violence
Christopher J. Knüsel and Bonnie Glencross
Part II
FROM RITES TO WRITING
Chapter 10. Introduction
Wolfgang Palaver and Thomas Ryba
Chapter 11
Lévi-Strauss and Girard on Myth and Ritual
Lucien Scubla
Chapter 12
The Axial Moment and Its Critics: Jaspers, Bellah, and Voegelin
Stephen Gardner
Chapter 13
Monotheism and the Abrahamic Revolution: Moving Out of the Archaic Sacred
Wolfgang Palaver
Chapter 14
The Eastern Revolution: From the Vedas to Buddhism, Jainism, and the Upanishads
Brian Collins
Chapter 15
The Classical World: Sacrifice, Philosophy, and Religion
Nidesh Lawtoo
Chapter 16
The Transition from Orality to Writing: Mimetic Theory and Religion
Phil Rose
Chapter 17
Biblical Interpretation: Old and New Testaments, a New Hermeneutic(s)?
Robert J. Daly
Chapter 18
Theological Inversions: Raymund Schwager, Robert G. Hamerton-Kelly, and James G. Williams
Mathias Moosbrugger
Chapter 19
Oedipus and Greek Tragedy
Sandor Goodhart
Chapter 20
Nietzsche, Dionysos, and the Crucified
James G. Williams
Part III
THEOLOGICAL ANTHROPOLOGY
Chapter 21. Introduction
James Alison and Martha Reineke
Chapter 22
An Epistemology of Revelation
John Ranieri
Chapter 23
Approaches to Atonement: How Girard Changes the Debate
S. Mark Heim
Chapter 24
Original Sin, Positive Mimesis
Petra Steinmair-Pösel
Chapter 25
Embodiment and Incarnation
Scott Cowdell
Chapter 26
Eucharist and Sacrifice: the Transformation of the Meaning of Sacrifice through Revelation
James Alison
Chapter 27
Girard and Augustine
Thomas Ryba
Chapter 28
Raymund Schwager: Dramatic Theology
Nikolaus Wandinger
Chapter 29
American Protestant Reception of Mimetic Theory: 1986-2015
Michael Hardin
Chapter 30
James Alison’s Theological Appropriation of Girard
John P. Edwards
Chapter 31
Levinas and the Prophetic Current
Sandor Goodhart
Chapter 32
Mysticism, Girard, and Simone Weil
Ann Astell
Chapter 33
From the Sacred to the Holy in the World’s Religions: Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism
Vanessa J. Avery
Part IV
SECULARIZATION AND MODERNITY
Chapter 34. Introduction
Paul Dumouchel and William A. Johnsen
Chapter 35
Secularization
Jean-Pierre Dupuy
Chapter 36
The Barren Sacrifice
Paul Dumouchel
Chapter 37
The Economy as the Opium of the People
Bernard Perret
Chapter 38
“The Carnal Mind Rebels”: Christianity and the Witch Hunt
David Dawson
Chapter 39
Mimetic Theory, Religion, and Literature as Secular Scripture
William A. Johnsen
Chapter 40
The Development of the Self
Paolo Diego Bubbio
Chapter 41
Modern Pathologies and the Displacement of the Sacred
Emanuele Antonelli
Chapter 42
Ressentiment and the Turn to the Victim: Nietzsche, Weber, Scheler
Stefano Tomelleri
Chapter 43
René Girard and Charles Taylor: Complementary Engagements with the Crisis of Modernity
Wolfgang Palaver
Chapter 44
Secularization Revisited: Tocqueville, Asad, Bonhoeffer, Habermas
Scott Cowdell
Part V
APOCALYPSE, POST-MODERNITY, AND THE RETURN OF RELIGION
Chapter 45 Introduction
Wolfgang Palaver and Jeremiah Alberg
Chapter 46
The Return of Religion
Jeremiah Alberg
Chapter 47
Mimetic Theory And The Katēchon
Michael Kirwan
Chapter 48
Hӧlderlin and Heidegger: Which God Will Save Us?
Cyril O’Regan
Chapter 49
“The Apocalypse Has Begun”: Ivan Illich and René Girard on Anti-Christ
David Cayley
Chapter 50
Weak Faith
Frederick Depoortere
Chapter 51
Terrorism and Religion
Elisabetta Brighi
Chapter 52
Apocalypse: Hope Against All Hope
Bruce K. Ward
Chapter 53
Enlightened Doomsaying
Wilhelm Guggenberger
Part VI
ALTERNATIVE PARADIGMS
Chapter 54 Introduction
Paul Dumouchel
Chapter 55
The New Atheism: Dawkins, Harris, Hitchens
Grant Kaplan
Chapter 56
Scientific Evidence for the Foundational Role of Psychological Mimesis
Scott Garrels
Chapter 57
Cognitive Neuroscience and Religion
Warren S. Brown
Chapter 58
Generative Anthropology
Eric Gans
Chapter 59
Critiques of Girard’s Mimetic Theory
Trevor Cribben Merrill
Chapter 60<
A Theory of Everything? A Methodological Tale
Paul Dumouchel
Chapter 61
Mimetic Theory and Self-Criticism
Jean-Marc Bourdin
Part VII
APPROACHING THE CONTEMPORARY
Chapter 62 Introduction
Andrew McKenna and Sheelah Treflé Hidden
Chapter 63
Scandal
Jeremiah Alberg
Chapter 64
Terrorism and the Escalation of Violence
Duncan Morrow
Chapter 65
Religious Conflicts in the Contemporary World
Vern Neufeld Redekop
Chapter 66
Modern Confessional Movements
Kris Rocke
Chapter 67
Mimetic Insights into the Sacred in Film
Joel Hodge
Chapter 68
Resurgent Religious Themes in Contemporary Film
Chris Fleming
Chapter 69
Pastoral Outreach and Community Living
Adam Ericksen
